


Hawke's Inferno

by wombuttress



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Humor, Parody
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-23
Updated: 2017-04-23
Packaged: 2018-10-22 21:48:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10705797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wombuttress/pseuds/wombuttress
Summary: Or, HELLSCAPE 3000: THE FUCKENINGWith no apologies to Dante whatsoever, Hawke and co. escape Hell.Hawke is offended he didn't get a better placement. Aveline denies everything. Bethany thinks the three-headed puppy is cute. Isabela robs her captors, has a ball. Fenris feels pretty at home, actually. Merrill expected this. Sebastian really didn't. Justice tries to start a demon's union. Carver is certain he doesn't deserve it. Anders is pretty he does. Varric is writing all this shit down.And what's up with this traditionally Christian Hell in a Andrastian universe, anyway?





	Hawke's Inferno

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alleged (alleged_grey_warden)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alleged_grey_warden/gifts).



Hawke wasn’t sure what surprised him more: that Hell existed—real, actual, literal Hell, just like it was written in the most obscure portions of the Chant—or that he had managed to land himself only in the outermost circle of it.

Oh, Hawke wasn’t surprised that he  _ was  _ in Hell. If his soul had any destination, fiery inferno was assuredly the only place for it. No doubt about that, alright.

But limbo? The lightest punishment for the gentlest sin of failing to be Andrastian? It was practically like he wasn’t in Hell at all.

Hawke had to say (mostly to the demons, who watched over the place like one might watch over an unheated pot to make sure it boils), that frankly, he felt a little bit ripped off.

The main thing was that Limbo was just so  _ boring.  _ It was crying babies and boring old philosophers as far as the eye could see. There was nothing to bloody do. “That’s the point,” the demons would say, exasperated with him. “You’re being punished, genius.”

“Bollocks,” Hawke muttered. At least being flagellated with flaming acid whips wouldn’t have been  _ boring. _

One of the demons, Belpheagor, who used to be stationed down at the City of Dis and complained constantly about the demotion (allegedly following a serious fuck-up with some mortal and his boyfriend), would tell Hawke stories sometimes, in exchange for wild tales of Hawke’s own adventures on the mortal plane. Now, the City of Dis! A screaming forest, pits of fire,  _ and  _ a river of blood? That sounded like a place someone could have a good time. Another one of the demons, Davis, thought it was pretty overrated. All gentrified now, it would say. Real estate values are shot. Had to sell the condo.

Hawke would listen and nod sympathetically, and asked if there was anything he could do. Hawke was good at that sort of thing.

“Listen,” said Hawke one day. “Isn’t it sort of funny that until I died I only ever heard of demons of, y’know, Pride and Desire and that sort of thing? They’d have names like, Audacity and Avarice and pretty much all looked the same. Purple titty ladies and big scaly monsters and living lava slabs. So how is it that I get to hell and you chaps have names like Belpheagor and Davis, and you look like all sorts of things?”

Belpheagor (who looked like a grotesquely muscular bird with huge black eyes and shrunken legs) and Davis (who resembled a yellowish pile of sludge with a beak and a goat’s eye) looked at each other.

“Well,” said Belpheagor.

“Uh,” said Davis.

“Look,” said Belpheagor, “Why don’t you go and do one of those--what do you call ‘em, those things you keep doing for us?”

“Quests,” Hawke said helpfully.

“Yeah, a quest,” Davis put in. “Look, we really need, uh,” he looked desperately at Belpheagor with his single rolling goat’s eye.

“Some torn trousers,” Belpheagor said quickly. “For our collection. We’ll need at least twenty pairs.”

Hawke brightened. “I’ll be right on it!”

Belpheagor and Davis sighed in relief as he hurried away. “We have gotta get rid of this guy,” Belpheagor muttered.

“Aw, I like him,” said Davis. “He’s funny. He tells jokes and keeps trying to escape.” Davis paused. “Although, most mortals try to escape  _ out  _ of Hell, not deeper into it. Gotta give this guy credit for novelty.”

“Sure, I like him,” said Belpheagor. “We all like Hawke. Hawke is great. Ever since that sister of his offered to trade her cushy spot in Limbo for his spot down in Circle Three, it’s been a lot livelier. But geez, he’s really a handful.”

“Thought you’d enjoy having a handful around,” said Davis. “You’re always complaining about how boring it is here compared to Dis.”

“Maybe retirement’s made me soft,” grumbled Belpheagor. “Where does he even keep getting all those trousers?”

Davis didn’t know, but hardly an hour had passed before Hawke returned once more with an armful of torn trousers.

“Here you go!” he said cheerfully, dumping them on the ground before the demons and dusting off his hands. “What’s the next quest?”

Belpheagor grimaced, which on his hideous bird face was an impressive grimace indeed. “Listen, Hawke,” he said. “Y’know, me and Dave here, we were thinking. You’ve been on mighty good behavior recently, and--”

“Really?” Hawke said, puzzled. “Even though I keep trying to break out?”

Belpheagor waved one of his hideous demon claws dismissively. “We aren’t gonna talk about that now. The point is, we like you, Hawke, and we figured, on account of you’re such a good guy, and you keep doing all these quests for us, we’re gonna let you go see the rest of Hell.”

Hawke’s chubby bearded face broke into a sunny smile. “Really!? Aw man, you guys are the best!” He gave both demons a big hug, coming away covered in sludge and feathers.

“But we’re not letting you escape,” said Belpheagor seriously, wagging a claw. “We’re just letting you out into the yard for some exercise, so to speak. You can totter around the other Circles, see what’s what, but then you have to come straight back, you hear?”

“Straight back,” Davis echoed.“Yeah, yeah,” Hawke said, already on his way to the entrance deeper into Hell. “I hear, alright. See you guys later.”

With that, Hawke descended into the Second Circle of Hell.

\--

On his way to the Second Circle, Hawke stopped at the Info Booth, manned by a friendly demon shaped like an enormous floating eyeball, and bought himself a map and a glazed donut in exchange for 1/47th of his immortal soul. He examined the map carefully as he munched.

The Second Circle was where Hawke would find the lustful, and therefore, he assumed, Isabela. He rolled up the map and put it under his arm, whistling as he went.

His whistling soon became well and truly lost in the howling of the winds, which had risen swiftly from breeze to gale to hurricane.

“Windy today, eh?” Hawke said in passing to one of the damned souls that was caught in the windstorm, but it didn’t even acknowledge him as it hurtled away.

“Well,” Hawke said huffily, even as his words were swallowed by the wind. “That is very rude. Very rude indeed!”

His hair had progressed from tousled and windswept in an attractive manner to an absolute mess. He  _ never  _ would have stood for this in life, he thought, grumbling and attempting to fix it as he looked for Isabela. Obviously, he was going to locate all his friends and bust them all out of here at first opportunity--but it was just so hard to get any of the damned souls to talk to him. None of them seemed to know where Isabela was, if they managed to say anything at all to him besides “Aaaaaa!” 

Eventually, Hawke found a friend of his--but not the one he expected.

“Aveline!” Hawke exclaimed in delight, snatching the red-haired warrior out of the slipstream and wrapping her in a hug. Then, he drew back, his brows furrowing. “Aveline?”

“Hawke!” said Aveline. “Hawke? I doubted  _ you’d  _ be one of the souls damned for lust. You never showed much interest in that sort of thing.”

“Oh, I’m not in here for lust,” said Hawke. “I was actually just up in Limbo. Can you believe it? Me! In Limbo!”

Aveline looked skeptical. “Really? Limbo? And not Gluttony?” she added, eyeing his generous stomach.

“I know!” Hawke moaned. “It’s practically like I’m not in Hell at all!”

“Speak for yourself,” Aveline said grumpily, and started rearranging her hair back into some semblance of order. “This place is bloody annoying. Let’s get out of here.”

“Sure thing,” chirped Hawke, “Off to Circle Three!”

\--

The Third Circle of Hell was somehow even less pleasant than the second one, which, in hindsight, should really not have been so surprising.

“Reminds me of late fall in Ferelden,” Hawke commented, shivering in the driving cold rain and slush.

“Ugh,” Aveline said. “I’d almost forgotten it, too.”

“Cheer up! It’s almost like being home!”

Aveline did not cheer up. “Well, this is the Circle of the Gluttonous,” she said. “I’d have assumed that  _ you’d  _ end up here.”

“What?” said Hawke. “I like a good meal. Or liked, before I ended up here. What’s wrong with that?”

“Evidently nothing-- _ you  _ were in Limbo.”

It was a lot of stomping around in the slush and icy rain (and avoiding a giant three headed dog, which Hawke and Aveline agreed that they  _ probably  _ would not be able to fight with just the two of them, while they were unarmed and damned, and besides, fighting a dog would just be  _ wrong  _ for a pair of red-blooded proper-minded Fereldens like them) before they finally found Bethany.

“Baby sister!” Hawke barrelled at her and enveloped her in the hugest, cuddliest bear-hug of his afterlife. “What are  _ you  _ doing here!”

“Well,” Bethany said, hugging back, “Bit of a funny story, really. I was sitting around in Limbo for the longest time, and it was so dull, and I heard from one of the friendly demons that you were coming, and heading straight for here! I couldn’t let that happen, so I offered to swap. I was pretty bored up there, anyway.”

Hawke’s eyes filled with tears. “Why you--selfless, amazing, complete idiot!”

“It’s not so bad here,” Bethany said, trying hard for cheerfulness. “At least avoiding the giant three-headed dog gives me something to do. And look, you managed to break out! So everything worked out, I think. How is everyone?”

“I’ll tell you everything when we get out of here,” said Hawke. “For now, let’s head out to the Fourth Circle. We have more party members to collect.”

At that point, the three-headed dog gave a massive bark, as though having spotted a particularly tempting chew toy to chase, cutting the tender reunion short.

\--

“According to my handy dandy map,” said Hawke, squinting at the colorful piece of paper, which was adorned with colorfully rendered flames and featured a cute devil mascot in the upper left corner, “this is the Circle of the Greedy.”

“Oh, well,” Bethany said, “it’s a shame that we never knew anybody greedy when we were alive.”

“Very sad,” Hawke agreed, regarding the hilly area that lay before them.

“Downright tragic,” Aveline agreed.

They stood and regarded the Fourth Circle for a while. 

“Alright, enough of that,” said Aveline. “Let’s find Isabela and get out of here.”

Here, surrounded by crowing demons cheering and waving pennants, the damned souls perpetually pushed boulders up hills and then crashed them into each other at the bottom, then pushed the boulders back up the hills and did it all over again. 

Hawke side-eyed Aveline. “Are you--?”

“Thinking about how much fun this looks?” she said. “Oh, yes.”

“Oh, come on, Aveline,” Hawke scoffed, “That is so childi--ha ha, look, those two guys  _ totally  _ just smashed into each other!”

“Ooh!” said Bethany. “The Third Circle was never this exciting!”

“Hey, you, hotdog devil,” Aveline barked at a passing concession salesdevil. “Three hotdogs over here or I’ll feed you your entrails!”

It was unclear just how many rounds of boulder jousting they watched before they got pickpocketed.

Hawke noticed the absence of weight at his hip and brightened immediately, spinning around. “Isabela!” he called, catching sight of her right before she disappeared into the crowd.

“Oh, Hawke!” she replied, relaxing. “What are you doing here?”

“Are you...pickpocketing the demons?” Bethany said as Hawke enveloped Isabela in one of his powerful hugs.

Isabela shrugged. “Only a little?”

“Typical,” Aveline snorted.

“Oh, yes, well, excuse me for having clever thief hands, and not man hands like you,” Isabela replied. “And just where were  _ you,  _ Big Girl?”

“Never mind that!” the ex-guardswoman barked. “Let’s just get to the Fifth Circle.”

“Ooh,” Isabela said with wicked delight. “Was it one of the really embarrassing ones?”

“Shut it, I’m warning you.”

“I bet it was--”

“I said shut it!”

\--

What followed was a very pleasant ride by the tourist ferry across the River Styx, where the companions had some overpriced ice cream cones and learned some fascinating facts about riverboats. Hawke stretched out on the deck and attempted to tan, even though above them was nothing but the cold dankness of an eternity of suffering, and not sunlight.

“Watch out,” said a voice over the announcement speaker. “We’re headed for some rough waters. Expect turbulence, due to tormented wrathful souls.”

“Oh!” Isabela exclaimed. “We know _ lots _ of tormented wrathful souls. We better watch out for our friends. Who do you think we’ll find first?”

“Carver, maybe,” Bethany suggested.

“Anders,” said Aveline decisively. 

“Or Fenris,” said Isabela.

“Could be Sebastian. Remember his attitude after the Chantrypalooza?” Hawke put in. “I’ll bet a few of my beard hairs for it.”

It ended up being Fenris, who seemed to be having a pretty good time beating everyone around him with his huge sword.

“Hah,” said Isabela. “I win. Beard hairs, please.”

“Unfair,” sniffed Hawke. “You don’t even have a beard to match my bet with. Oi, Fenris!”

It took a few more oi’s before Fenris deigned to pause his vicious assault on his fellow tormented wrathful souls. “Hawke,” he said, voice a mixture of pleased and exasperated. “If you’re here to tell me not to kill more people, don’t bother.”

“How could you say that,” Hawke said, wounded. “I let you kill people all the time.”

“I don’t think you can kill them,” Bethany called. “They’re already dead.”

“Well, not with that attitude he can’t,” said Aveline.

“Come on, Fenris, let’s go,” Hawke said. “We’re going to the big city! Come on, someone help me fish him out.”

“Oh, joy,” Fenris said dryly, but snatched the rope when it was thrown to him. “I suppose violence is always more fun with friends.”

“That’s the spirit!” Isabela said. “I mean, isn’t that the whole point of our little friend-group?”

“Exactly!” Hawke said jovially. “In fact, we should probably check around the river to see if anyone else is here before moving on.”

“On it,” Isabela said,whistling, and strolled up to go commandeer the riverboat to lead a quick mutiny and make herself the captain.

\--

They moved on to the Sixth Circle, and the City of Dis.

“I’m worried about Carver,” Bethany fretted as the city loomed on the horizon. “He wasn’t among the wrathful. What kind of trouble could he have gotten himself into that he’s further down?”

“Is being a pissant a sin?” Fenris asked.

“Fenris! That’s my brother you’re talking about!” Hawke paused, then continued. “I really hope not, because then he’d be in  _ real _ trouble.”

Everyone present nodded soberly.

“According to my map,” said Hawke, after Isabela had happily crashed the boat into the shore, “all the best restaurants and hotels are in the eastern quarter.”

“We aren’t here for that,” Aveline said. “We need to find our heretic friends.”

“I thought we were all heretics,” Fenris said. 

“Can’t we at least take a walking tour?” Hawke complained, but Aveline marched stolidly on through the dismal streets of the Sixth Circle of Hell.

They eventually found Merrill, which wasn’t a surprise. What was a surprise was that they found her comforting a despondent Sebastian, of all people, inside the flaming tomb they were sharing.

“Merrill!” said Isabela, reaching down to pull her up and grinning.

“Isabela!” said Merrill, brightening considerably at the sight of her.

“Sebastian?” Fenris said.

“Me,” Sebastian said miserably.

“Oh, wow,” said Hawke as Merrill and Isabela embraced. “How did you get in here?”

“Oh, well,” said Merrill, muffled slightly from within Isabela’s cleavage. “I think it might be because I’m a blood mage, and also Dalish, meaning that I don’t believe in the Maker or any of that shemlen nonsense. That probably qualifies me as a heretic.”

“Sure, but Sebastian?” Aveline said. “I thought you repented.”

“It turns out I was preaching a slightly wrong version of orthodoxy my whole life,” Sebastian said morosely. “I’d mistakenly believed an incorrect account of transubstantiation, which was enough to make me a heretic.”

“He’s been crying for  _ ages,”  _  Merrill whispered. 

“What’s transubstantiation?” said Hawke.

“Well--”

“I was being sarcastic,” Hawke said. “Quit moping and let’s go!”

“What, just leave Hell?” said Sebastian. “Wouldn’t we get into even bigger trouble if we got caught?”

“Not if we don’t get caught,” said Isabela, tapping her temple.

“And if we do get caught, we kill them,” added Fenris, tapping his sword against his heel.

“With fire,” added Bethany, igniting her palms.

“You do make good points,”  agreed Sebastian. “Yes, let’s go. Er, why are we heading  _ deeper  _ into Hell? I thought we were escaping.”

“We have a few sinners who committed acts even more heinous than straying from orthodoxy on the subject of transubstantiation,” said Hawke. “Impossible as that may seem.”

\--

“This place reminds me of Kirkwall,” Merrill said.

“We’re literally in Hell,” said Sebastian. “There’s demons everywhere. We’re here to suffer. It’s  _ Hell.” _

“He is correct,” said Fenris. “And we are headed ever deeper into it.”

“I think those trees are screaming,” said Bethany.

“I just saw a fish demon eat a frog demon,” said Isabela, “and then shit it out all over a group of damned souls.”

“Exactly,” Merrill said. “Reminds me of home.”

“Man,” said Hawke. “It’s sort of been a while since I ditched Limbo. I wonder if my old buddies Davis and Belpheagor miss me?”

Hawke should have been more careful about the verbal irony. What followed almost immediately was a protracted battle with a whole slew of demons come to arrest them and return them to their proper places in Hell, and lasted nearly five entire minutes, followed by fifteen minutes of picking through the loot.

“Ooh,” said Hawke, bending down. “Torn trousers!”

“Ooh,” said Bethany, pointing. “Glowing!” 

All the companions looked to where she pointed and saw a familiar blonde-haired beanpole in a hideous coat, glowing blue--somewhat, anyway. Mostly he was covered in blood, presumably from the river of blood that flowed nearby, filled to the brim with the tormented souls who had committed violence, in which he was sitting.

“Anders!” Hawke exclaimed. “Haha, mass violence! Nice sin, buddy,  _ way  _ better than mine.”

“I am not Anders,” said Justice, blinking. “You mean to say he is not with you?”

“Oh, goodness,” said Merrill. “I didn’t realize this would happen! You’ve been separated! There’s two Anders running around now?”

Fenris visibly shivered at this notion, letting out an involuntary hiss.

“Wait,” said Aveline. “I don’t understand. If Justice is a demon--or, spirit,” she amended, “or whatever, then why is he a damned soul down here? Aren’t these your fellows?” she gestured around at the milling demons, most of whom were toothy mouths with little feet and not much else.

“If they were really my fellows, one might think they’d listen to my advice,” Justice muttered, then shrugged. “My time bonded to Anders has made me rather human. I am here to suffer forever for the sin of violence, as is just. I have been attempting to make the best possible use of my time here, but these creatures do not seem particularly receptive.”

“Excellent, so he is not coming with us,” said Fenris. “Let’s proceed.”

“Good idea,” Sebastian agreed.

“Aw, c’mon,” Hawke whined. “No one left behind, Justice!”

“No,” said the spirit staunchly.

Hawke looked around at his companions. Fenris and Sebastian seemed just about fine with it. Aveline didn’t seem  _ heartbroken.  _ Bethany looked uncomfortable, but only shrugged at him when he met her eyes.

Merrill’s big green eyes filled with tears. “Hawke, we just  _ can’t  _ leave him! He’ll be all  _ alone! _ ”

Hawke opened his mouth, and then saw the deadly daggers Isabela was glaring at him over Merrill’s shoulder. ‘Make her cry and I’ll make  _ you  _ cry’, that look said.

“Say, Justice,” said Hawke. “Anders is down here even further, y’know, and it seems real--uh, unjust?--that that’s happening? So, er, maybe just come along until we get him?”

“You raise a good point,” said the spirit. “Very well--I accompany you until at least then, and then return for the remainder of my punishment. Come. The gatekeeper to the Eighth Circle is this way.”

Justice turned and marched off into a side alley, taking twisting turns and paths that the others would never have noticed. He seemed pretty at home in Hell. Hawke wondered if it was much like the Fade.

Eventually they reached the outskirts of the city, where a massive three-bodied beast lay at the edge of a cliff, adorned with many horns and warts and extraneous eyeballs.

It waved friendlily to Justice as he approached. “Hey, buddy!” it called.

Justice turned to the party. “I am long-acquainted with many of the spirits that reside here,” he said seriously. “Be--as it is said--cool.”

Everyone nodded solemnly, except Fenris, who pulled a face like an equine about to spit.

Justice exchanged several minutes of idle chit-chat and catching up with the beast, inquiring about its health and family and trading a handful of inside-jokes, that probably only made sense to immortal beings of aether, before finally securing them passage on its back to the Eighth Circle.

“This is great, guys,” whispered Hawke. “We’ve got an in!”

\--

The demonbeast gave them a nice tour as it flew.

“And directly below you you’ll see the forest of suicides!” it said cheerily, pointing with one of its hairy paws. “And if you look to your right, you’ll see the field of sodomites!” It gestured with its scorpion tail.

Hawke looked. “Oh wow,” he said, clinging to one of the demon’s many protrusions. “I know like half of those guys. That one owes me money.”

“Three of those guys owe me money,” said Isabela. “That one over there owes me a parrot.”

“Excuse me,” Sebastian addressed the beast, “do you mind circling around that pit of blasphemers a second time, please? Many of my friends were blasphemers. All of them, as a matter of fact. Actually, could you make that a third time?”

“Never mind that,” Hawke said after the second pass. “According to the map we’re coming up on the Eighth Circle, home of the liars and fraudulent. I want my dwarf buddy back!”

Everyone shared some affectionate nods (as well as they could from their position of hurtling through hell on the back of a hideous and irritatingly friendly beast), all very impressed that Varric had sinned so grievously as to land in the second-deepest Circle of Hell.

“Make sure to buy a souvenir!” the beast called as it set them down in the Eighth Circle. The Eighth Circle wasn’t much to look at; it was mostly just a long series of pits arranged in concentric circles.

“Reminds me of the Third Circle,” Bethany said. “Not very impressive compared to the last one, is it?”

“If Varric were here,” Merrill said sadly, “he’d say this place was it was ‘the pits’. He made that joke about the Bone Pit every time we went there...”

Hawke snapped his fingers. “The Bone Pit!  _ That’s  _ where this Hell place has been reminding me of! Man, that’s been bugging me since forever.”

Eventually they located Varric not in any of the pits, but sitting on a rock formation, surrounded by eagerly listening demons.

“No shit,” he was saying, “it really happened like that! And after the squad of--Hawke!” 

“Hawke!” echoed the demons jovially.

“You know him?” Aveline questioned.

The demons had already surrounded Hawke, shaking his hand and requesting autographs. “We  _ love  _ this guy,” said one of them, a demon with the head of a shark and two meaty, hairy legs. “Varric’s been telling us great stories about him!”

“Oh, yeah?” said Hawke with interest.

“Oh, no,” said everyone else.

“What was it like, turning into a huge dragon?” said one of the minor imps. “What’s fire taste like? Always wanted to breathe fire!”

“Well, you feel really big,” Hawke said, “and you can fly, and fire? Tastes pretty...hot.”

The demons all gasped. “It’s all true!” They began cavorting excitedly. Nobody could cavort as well as a demon.

“You mean to tell us,” Fenris said to them, “that a soul damned to Hell for the sin of fraudulence has been telling you stories, and you’ve been believing them?”

The imps did not deign to cease their cavorting to answer him. He sighed.

“I’m beginning to see how you got away, Hawke,” Aveline said dryly.

“Let’s see,” Varric said, grinning around at everyone. “Here’s Aveline, Broody, Sunshine, Daisy, Rivaini, Choir Boy, Blondie--”

“Actually, I am Justice,” said Justice. “I am pleased to meet you. Do I also receive a nickname?”

“Geez, uh...sure.” Varric scratched his head. “Would ‘Boom Boom’ be in poor taste?”

“Yes,” said Justice.

“Great!” Varric clapped his hands. “So where are Junior and Blondie?”

“Probably keeping each other company down in Circle Nine, home of traitors,” said Hawke. “Off we go, before these fellows get tired of their cavort.”

\--

“Oooh,” said Merrill as they approached the deepest Circle of Hell. “This looks like the perfect spot for Dalish knife-shoe water-walking!”

“What’s that?” Isabela asked.

“It’s very simple,” Merrill said. “You find a nice frozen surface like this one, put on these sorts of shoes with knives strapped to the bottoms, and you slide around on the ice! It’s a lot of fun.”

“Ooh,” said Isabela.

“Blood mages,” Fenris muttered to Sebastian. “They think enough knives will solve any problem.”

“To be fair,” said Sebastian, “that also describes Isabela. And Hawke. And you. Except you use one very large knife instead of a variety of small ones.”

“Shh.”

“Well, Merrill, perhaps another time,” said Hawke, as though that wasn’t the most ludicrous thing he’d ever heard in his life. “Let’s get Carver and Anders. Or at least I really  _ hope  _ they’re here because if we end up having to backtrack, I will be extremely put out.”

But Carver, at least, they located quickly, halfway-frozen into the surface of the icy lake, upside down.

“Ha, ha,” said Hawke, as Bethany careful melted him out with fire magic. “That’s what you get for becoming a Templar, you little shit. How’d that work out for you, you betrayer of family?”

“It was all  _ his  _ fault,” Carver muttered sullenly as he shivered. “They were going to let me stay in Limbo, but then  _ he  _ had to start mouthing off and getting them angry.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t  _ you  _ who was mouthing off, Carver?”

“That’s beside the point!”

“Who’s ‘ _ he’  _ anyway?”

Carver pointed to the center of the lake, where a truly massive leathery demon sat frozen to the waist within it. And right by him was…

“Anders!” Hawke exclaimed, and attempted to run toward him, slipped comedically on the ice, and then slid part of the way there before getting up and repeating the sequence. The rest of the party followed suit, slowly slipping and sliding their way over to him.

“And another thing,” Anders was saying to the huge demon, “It really is--Justice?!”

“Anders!” 

“Hawke!”

“Aw shucks,” said Hawke, sniffling, partially out of emotions and partially because it was cold, “look at this, the whole family is back together again!”

Bethany finished melting Anders out of the ice. “Why are  _ you  _ in here, Anders?” she said. “Is this about the Chantry situation? Because Hawke didn’t even care about being lied to.”

“Yes, why don’t you tell them,” Carver muttered.

Anders rolled his eyes. “As it happened,” he said irritably, “I was  _ supposed  _ to be in Dis for mass violence, but I just chanced to share a few of my opinions on this whole Hell setup with the demon who was taking me there--so I was left down here to freeze my balls off for  _ technically  _ betraying the city I was living in.” 

He looked at Justice, who looked exactly like himself but softly glowed blue. “Alright, this is pretty weird. What’s even going to happen when we get out of here?”

“ _ If  _ we get out of here,” Bethany said worriedly.

“You guys trying to escape?” the massive frozen demon said.

“Oh, shit,” said Isabela. “Caught. Looks like it’s time for Plan B.” Fenris took out his sword and started whistling.

“No! Chill out, geez,” said the demon, which was large and terrifying enough to conceivably be the Head Demon. There was a pause. “No? ‘Chill out’, because we’re in a frozen lake? Oh, whatever,” it muttered.

“Are you sure I can’t--”

“Relax, Fenris.”

“Anyway,” said the demon, munching on the traitors caught amidst its spearlike teeth, “if you’re escaping, I’ll let it happen if you take the chatterbox wizard with you.”

“Me?” said Anders, offended.

“Please,” the demon said desperately, “He hasn’t shut up since he got here. I’m so tired. I’m stuck here too, you know! I might technically be the boss, but look at all the good it’s done me!”

“Sure,” Anders said, “Start talking about the plight of the oppressed and it’s like I’m the one torturing  _ you.” _

“Look, the emergency exit is behind that stalagmite,” said the demon, pointing over its shoulder with a thumb. “You want out, go. Just take motormouth here with you.”

“Oh, I have a thing or two to say about--”

“Wait!” Sebastian cried out. “I just realized something.”

Shockingly enough, everyone shut up and looked at Sebastian.

“Is it me,” he said, after reeling for a moment in pleasant shock, “or does none of this make any sense?”

“What, you mean all the toothtoad beasts and scorpion-lions?” said Isabela. “No, that seems like something we’d have run into back home.”

“If we’re all dead,” Sebastian went on, “oughtn’t our souls have passed through the Fade and into the beyond?”

“I’d assume this is that namely beyond, then,” said Fenris.

“But we have no cultural context for a place like this whatsoever!” Sebastian protested. “I’ve never even  _ heard  _ of a place called Hell! Shouldn’t we be calling a place like this the Void instead?”

“Well,” Carver said eventually. “I suppose…”

“Y’know, the demons in here are real different from the usual sorts of demons we used to run into,” Hawke commented. “They’re a lot more fun, honestly.”

“And this one,” Sebastian said, pointing to the boss demon. “We don’t even have a Satan figure in Andrastianism! Who is he?”

The demon shrugged, as though that wasn’t really his problem.

“And come to think of it,” Sebastian said, becoming more and more incensed as he spoke, “Andrastianism also doesn’t have any concept of transubstantiation! This is all a load of poppycock! My friends, I believe we’ve been had!”

“Look, buddy,” said the demon, “I already said you could leave. Do you really have to raise a big stink over it?”

“No, no,” said Varric, “Choir Boy is right. By all accounts, this doesn’t make any sense.”

“Oh, who cares?” said Aveline, stomping dangerously on the ice. “Let’s just get out of here.”

But before they could get out of there, the frozen surface of the lake flooded with demons, devils, imps, and assorted hellish denizens. The party drew their weapons, preparing to fight off the dramatic final-act confrontation--but it seemed that the demonic delegation was not here for them.

“Woah,” said the boss demon as the devilish crowd slid and skittered around on the ice, attempting to steady itself. “What’s going on here?”

One of the demons at the front, an egg with chicken legs, scuttled to the front. “Ahem,” it said. “We’re unionizing. We have demands.”

“You’re what?” said the huge demon.

Justice suddenly beamed, his whole face lighting up--more than it was already lit up, anyway. “They took my words to heart!”

“You convinced the demons to unionize?” Anders said, impressed.

“Yes!” Justice said happily.

“ _ You  _ convinced the demons to unionize?” the head demon growled, bending to them.

“No!” said Hawke.

“Hawke,” Aveline growled, “We should really get out of here.”

“Yes,” sniffed Sebastian, “Away with this wretched, inconsistently described Hell! I wash my hands of it!”

They fled, the massive demon roaring as it was swarmed by the newly formed demonic worker’s collective.

“This reminds me of when we were kids,” Bethany commented. “Remember all the fleeing we did back then? Good times.”

“Good times,” Carver agreed.

“I think it’s lovely that we’re all together now, don’t you?” Merrill said cheerfully, and the event of escaping Hell together was just enough to cause Fenris and Anders not to make any kind of mean comment whatsoever, and remain in sullen silence instead.

“Wait, shit,” Isabela said, “I should have stolen something! When am I ever going to make a getaway like this? Hawke, can we go back?”

“Actually, hey, that might be pretty fun,” said Varric. “I could write a book about a journey through Hell!”

“You are all ridiculous,” Aveline growled. “Do you even hear yourselves?”

The beginnings of an argument prompted Fenris and Anders to start their own private argument, just for kicks. Soon the egressing group was nothing but a torrid, travelling fight.

“Aw,” Hawke sniffed, opening the emergency exit door to the bright white light beyond. “I love you guys.”

**Author's Note:**

> i have 3 types of fanfic
> 
> 1\. silly romcoms  
> 2\. serious and extremely pretentious experimental pieces about my ocs exploring themes of narrative, redemption, humanity, etc.  
> 3\. horsesehit like this
> 
> [my tumblr](http://wombuttress.tumblr.com/)   
>  [my oc blog](http://pile-of-dragon-filth.tumblr.com/)


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